Will I
? Paetro’s words during the flight to the palace in Arcadia had been proved prophetic. A life in Weyland seemed small beyond insignificance after living in the imperium. Arcadia’s canals were open sewers compared to the endless towering majesty of Vandis, Arcadia’s buildings a lean-to of foresters’ hovels compared to the imperial capital. The House of Landor’s grasping avarice was almost a joke compared to the power wielded by the most minor of the imperium’s families. Vandia was the centre of the world. Weyland and the league, the whole Lanca, nothing but a distant backwood at the nub-end of the caravan routes. What counted as civilization here only subsisted on scraps from Vandia, passed between rattling traders’ caravans for centuries until the metals finally drifted through Riverlarn and Creedlore and Havenharl. Duncan had seen the wide expanse of the world. His eyes had been opened. Living in Northhaven would be life in a cage; it would be no life at all, a mere existence, savage and constricted and forever haunted by the glories of the empire.
I can never go back
. Paetro had seen the truth of it, and perhaps Willow had too, when she’d treated him like a stranger. Even Benner Landor had forgotten he possessed a son, handling Duncan like an ally to be wheedled to his side.
‘I’ll stay,’ said Duncan, reluctantly. ‘With your house, not here.’
‘Then we have our life,’ said Helrena. She sounded as if she had known all along that this was the decision Duncan would make.
She’s surer of me than I am
. ‘And we will spend it well,’ she added.
And how hollow will our victory be
? Duncan had never realized he could feel so conflicted. Helrena was right. This unholy alliance would help bring Cassandra back unharmed. It might even bring Helrena the throne, albeit as only half its owner. And after that, the risks would never be greater … and
he
could play a part in it. Duncan Landor, former slave of the imperium, now a free citizen. And the woman who would be its mistress would embed him in the centre of all this, astride history, seizing the chance to shape the world, or as much of Pellas as truly counted.
And all I have to sacrifice to rise high beyond mortal dreams … is my love for her
…
Duncan walked through the corridors of the house behind a servant, marble floors and oak panels absorbing his footsteps. It was the first time he had visited Willow’s new home. A fine old pile, but crumbling around the edges, scaffolds still up where repair work was being undertaken. In wartime such labour was hard to find, and no doubt they were paying a pretty penny for their workmen. They climbed a wide set of stairs and turned towards the front of the house and its commanding views over the grounds below. Distant music tinkled down the corridor, growing louder as they approached a double set of white-painted doors. The servant knocked, opened the door and bade Duncan enter.
‘See that we are undisturbed,’ commanded Leyla Landor, the servant bowing in response and closing the door to the music room. She had been playing at the piano situated in the corner, surrounded by leather divans for an audience that was wholly missing. Apart from Duncan, of course. It was probably true then, the rumours he had heard, Benner Landor’s new wife had been on the stage at some time in the past.
She’s certainly pretty enough
.
‘I expected to see my father here,’ said Duncan. ‘To hear his answer and to meet with my sister.’
‘I know all about the need to secure your sister’s help. Your father asked me to ensure Willow’s cooperation. He has other matters on his mind of late. Benner is helping the wet nurse take little Asher around the grounds for some air,’ said Leyla. ‘Benner is quite besotted with his new son. He even insists on swaddling the babe himself rather than trusting our nursery staff.’
‘I can’t remember him ever setting aside his business for myself or my sister.’
‘He is older now,’ said Leyla. ‘A man’s perspective on such things changes with age. You should not hold it against him.’
‘You have softened him.’
‘Perhaps. A female touch has long been lacking at the park. A house with no mistress is a sad and lonely thing.’
‘My father can play happy families all he cares to,’ said Duncan, not bothering to hide his bitterness. ‘And my new half-brother is welcome to Hawkland Park and all it holds. My life lies in the imperium, now. Where is my sister?’
‘I asked my manservant Nocks to escort her to a public execution outside the capital’s eastern gate. Six would-be rebels who were caught distributing pamphlets denouncing the loyalist cause. Willow has agreed to help retrieve Lady Cassandra from Midsburg, but I detected a certain reluctance in her tone. A demonstration of what will happen to her old friends if she doesn’t cooperate may help
soften
her.’
Duncan snorted. ‘As I understand it, the Carnehan family are not in the king’s gift to hang anymore.’
‘Oh, but they will be again, if they’re not caught escaping north first, or shot fighting for the assembly and the rebels later. A useful half-truth that will serve us well in rescuing poor Lady Cassandra from those who hold her captive.’
‘You sound as sure of victory as I am,’ said Duncan.
‘Naturally. I was at court long before I travelled north and married your father. The north is rich in land and peasants required to farm it. The south is rich in mills and forges and such produce that may be manufactured. You can eat wheat and you can burn corn oil, but it takes bullets and iron to kill your foe. Even without the Vandians supporting King Marcus, the loyalist cause would have swept the north before it, iron against wheat, grinding them into dust. This is a rebellion with only one outcome.’
‘And you don’t question where all this new-found wealth comes from?’
‘You sound like a harping Creedlore news sheet. You’re not a stupid man, Duncan Landor; wealth comes from power and those who wield it. In this century as in any moment selected from the last ten thousand years. The only question is whether you wish to be the noble who owns the plough, or the back bent working behind it. I had to answer the same question many years ago. As did your father. And you know what answer he reached.’
‘I was half expecting to arrive to find Willow had refused me,’ said Duncan.
‘I hold another card to play,’ smiled Leyla, toying coyly with her long blonde ringlets. ‘Willow has been unkind to the domestics here, letting her temper fly. One of our men ended up on the wrong end of a blade and did not survive the altercation. Willow could probably plead her belly and be forgiven by a magistrate; especially as she is Lady Wallingbeck now. But luckily for you, Willow is not willing to take that chance.’
‘Willow?’ said Duncan. ‘Willow
murdered
a man?’
‘What Willow endured as a slave has left her unhinged,’ sighed Leyla. ‘Full of strange fancies and seeing threats behind every curtain. Your sister has become a very different creature to the girl you grew up with in Northhaven. It is understandable. What a terrible trial she endured. Some people emerge from such a tempering as steel,’ she touched Duncan’s sleeve and squeezed his muscles, ‘others are fractured by the same events. But if her crime gives us the chance we need to save your poor young imperial noblewoman then some good will yet come of this.’
Fractured
. Duncan remembered the almost feral pastor of Northhaven, facing him below the volcano’s eruption during the slave revolt. ‘Some good, perhaps. You make it sound very practical.’
‘Women always are, in the end. I have done what is required. I have bent Willow’s will to aid you,’ said Leyla, ‘and I would have my reward.’
‘Your reward?’ said Duncan. ‘When King Marcus can tell the Vandians that Cassandra has been freed from the rebels, I am sure the king will grant my father all the titles he desires. Maybe the old man will be made a prefect of the north.’
‘He
is
an old man,’ said Leyla. ‘And the reward I have in mind isn’t his to claim.’ Leyla pulled Duncan close by the shirt, kissing him passionately until he pushed back in surprise verging on shock.
‘In the saints’ name, what are you doing?’
Her eyes glinted impishly and challenging. ‘Am I so unattractive with a few extra pounds still upon me? I thought you northern men liked their women cushioned against the chill.’
In truth she was far from unattractive, but still. ‘You are my father’s
wife
.’
‘Benner has not visited my bed once during my pregnancy or in the days after,’ complained Leyla, her cheeks flushed with mischief. ‘Was not this arrangement always about producing a new heir to your house? Well, Asher is produced. I know Benner would never have married me otherwise, not if he had not believed both his children enslaved and dead. He refused every suitor from the court for decades.’
‘My heart lies with another,’ said Duncan, but his heart had quickened at her touch, the hesitation in his words telling another story. Leyla was closer to his age than Helrena by many years, and her face was so pretty it could have been fashioned from porcelain.
And she has not rejected me
. Unlike the mistress of his house, this lady was a beautiful young woman who seemed to appreciate his virtues.
‘I do not speak of hearts here, Duncan. I am still cursed with the blushing fire of a woman’s youth. I have seen how these matters run many times at the court. Old men take young brides to continue a proud family’s line, but spend more time with their estate’s ledgers and the stable’s hunting hounds. Those young brides eventually end up pushing around their husbands in a wooden nursing chair. I do not begrudge Benner this. I went into our union with open eyes. It is almost the natural order of events. I love him and will look after him until the bitter end. But I care for Benner too much to cuckold him with one of the park’s staff. You may not want the house, but it is still your duty to step in as the heir where he falters. I have given you my support in everything, now it is time to seal the union with more than fine words.’
‘I am not certain, this—’
‘This only tells me how wisely I have chosen. Soon enough you’ll be laying siege to Midsburg alongside Benner and Willow’s husband, Lord Wallingbeck, alongside almost everyone in Arcadia I have ever known or cared about. Who is to say which of you will return, or how badly injured? I am a full cup which Benner does not wish to drink. We’re both alive now. Let us live … you deserve this too.’
Those words sounded uncannily like Helrena’s, remade as a command, and Duncan felt the truth of them as Leyla tore at his clothes and he gave up trying to hold on to his own self-control, pushing her down against a divan and drinking from her glass until he had to clamp a hand around her mouth to still her cries.
She’s right. I do deserve this
. Duncan had set aside the house of his birth, but it seemed it still had duties to tire him.
Such delicious ones
.
All across the warship’s hangar were engineers checking helo engines and cannons, blades suspended above the fighters’ fuselage hanging still and quiet as ground crew drove silent electric wagons between the aircraft, long trails of trolleys winding behind them, loaded with grey-metal bombs and rockets, warheads painted with concentric yellow circles like the angry warning stripes on a bee.
Regimental standards hung from the walls, triangular tapestries on ornamental silver staffs; partially obscured by crates of supplies covered in black netting, officers in green uniforms with stiff, high collars, supervising lines of sailors passing the materials of war in chains towards the helos. Squatting amongst this organized chaos was the long-range patrol ship to be used to land in the forests outside Midsburg. Not for the first time, Duncan wished he would be going with Paetro’s legionaries to rescue Cassandra.
I’ll have to trust Willow
, he sighed.
And look how well that worked the last time you put your life in her hands
, mocked the malicious voice inside his mind. Unlike the other military craft crowding the hangar, the patrol ship was being stripped down by its engineers, everything heavy that could be removed ending up in a heap alongside the long steel-hulled dart. They were planning a night flight and stealth, the faster the better. Everything after that would be in the hand of the saints – and the loyal old fighter checking a line of guns on a folding table. These were tools of the legions’ trade, not the primitive single-shot rifles procured from Gidorian merchants as their ticket of entry into the enemy city. Duncan drew closer. A legionary was demonstrating the hidden compartment they had added to a trader’s cart, for concealing the deadly Vandian weapons until they had infiltrated Midsburg. Each gun had something resembling a large metal can screwed to the end of the barrel, to silence the gun’s otherwise explosive fire.
‘Are these those famous weapons the legionaries carry?’
Paetro quietened the other soldier with a wave of his hand and turned to Duncan. ‘They’re still under lock and key, lad. The imperial armourers travel with the fleet and they’re always picky about when and where they release the emperor’s bounty. This one’s designed by Doctor Horvak, though …’ He passed a bulky hand weapon to Duncan, a weighty pistol with a magazine jutting from a smooth steel handle; its black barrel flared and slashed with vents. ‘It has the range of a rifle. Each shell is powered by a rocket and explodes with a grenade’s force. Keep it for luck.’
Duncan took the gun. ‘Doesn’t seem like a fair fight.’
‘That’s my favourite sort – as long as the odds weigh heavy in my favour. I know this isn’t what you wanted, lad.’
Duncan understood Paetro wasn’t talking about the raid to free Lady Cassandra or Willow’s reluctant participation in the rescue. ‘You always told me the day would come when Helrena would set me aside.’
‘I did and there’s nothing personal in it. Helrena Skar was raised to be a princess of the celestial caste first and a woman second.’
‘How far do you think can we trust Prince Gyal?’
‘Well enough up until the point he calls himself emperor,’ said Paetro. ‘Beyond that? Only the ancestors know. It’s been a while since an emperor’s ruled Vandia with a first-wife calling herself empress. Sharing power is like sharing a good pie. Someone always ends up with the pastry while the other steals the juicy meat. It’ll be interesting times for us, that much is certain.’